Bringing the Literary Hammer Down

Remember when you walked in late to freshman English, bar stamps on the back of your hand, bracelets dangling on your wrist, and Professor Bumbletooth asked if you read the assignment? Umm . . . you see . . . what happened was . . . . Well, if you missed enjoying stories by American masters in college, you'll have a chance at redemption at the reading event Some Favorite Writers: Daniel Orozco and Jesse Ball at the Hammer Museum. Orozco  author of the highly anthologized story "Orientation," whose work has appeared in Best American Short Stories  is famous for writing about work. And we're not talking about the Detroit, blue-collar poetry of Philip Levine or even the that's-what-she-said world of The Office. We're talking about serial killers working in cubicles and the ghost of a dead wife appearing in computer monitors and copy toner. This is twisted shit, but Orozco somehow demands his audience understand that the workplace can reveal truth and (just freaking write it) beauty. The night also features novelist and poet Jesse Ball, winner of Paris Review's 2008 Plimpton Prize, lucid dreamer and professor of lying. Ball and Orozco will make you wish you'd paid attention to Bumbletooth, even if he did speak Klingon during class. Hammer Museum, 10899 Wilshire Blvd., Wstwd.; Wed, July 13, 7 p.m.; $10 museum admission, $5 seniors. (310) 443-7000, hammer.ucla.edu.Wed., July 13, 7 p.m., 2011